Cellular or wireless telecommunication systems typically use tall cell towers which are widely deployed. They can be easily seen, for example, as one drives along the U.S. Interstate highway system. Cellular-system equipment, such as amplifiers, filters, and/or power supplies, etc., used for generating the signals radiated from a tower's antennae may be positioned on top of that tower if that equipment is outdoors-hardened. Outdoors-hardened equipment can withstand wide temperature variations such as, e.g., from minus 20 to plus 55 degrees Centigrade, with high humidity. Alternatively, such equipment, with or without outdoor-hardening, may be located inside a building alongside other more sensitive operating cellular-system equipment that needs a temperature/humidity-controlled environment. Both of these locations are problematic for different reasons.
For equipment atop a tower that has malfunctioned, any servicing of that equipment must be handled by specially-trained, “certified riggers” who are capable of climbing tall towers and repairing that equipment under hazardous conditions. Not only must these people perform intricate repair and replacement tasks on top of these tall towers, but when severe weather conditions intervene, which may have contributed to the malfunction in the first place, this can make their tasks even more dangerous. When these repairs must be made on a priority or emergency basis, they cannot wait for better weather conditions. Therefore, these specialized personnel are paid very well for their services which are very costly for the telecommunications company needing them.
In the other case, for equipment that is outdoor-hardened but housed in an environmentally-controlled building, that equipment causes the telecommunications company to build a larger building than they would otherwise have to build. A larger building, based on local zoning or property-line setback requirements, may require a larger lot size, costing more, as compared with a lot for a smaller building. Of course, there are higher costs of construction for a bigger building. Further, because of the building's larger size and because of the heat-contribution from the unnecessarily housed equipment, there are much higher costs of installation and maintenance of the air conditioning and humidity control systems. There is a need, therefore, to locate outdoor-hardened operating equipment outdoors, in a safe and secure place which is easily accessed by cellular system technicians who are not certified riggers, and which does not require a larger than necessary, environmentally-controlled, building with its higher costs and inefficiency.